Subject: Re: Lightwave 4.0 fp woes
From: [email-masked] (John Crookshank)
To: [email-masked]
Date: Tue, 20 Feb 1996 22:29:25 -0800

On 19-Feb-96 22:19:58, Brian Dady ([email-masked]) Emailed: 

> I also have a PP&S 040 board, and even with one of the earlier versions 
> of Lightwave (3.0 or 3.1, probably not 3.5) it was necessary to rename 
> Lightwave and Modeler because part of the fpu instructions are carried 
> out in software instead of hardware with many 68040's.  Because of this 
> the software did not recognize the fpu, necessitating the name change of
>  the executables so the fp versions would be used.  Perhaps this is true
>  of 4.0 also.  I can't confirm this because I did not get mine yet.

> However, it is easy to test this theory.  Rename Lightwave to 
> Lightwave.orig and Lightwave.fp to Lightwave.  Use the same method of 
> renaming Modeler.  If they both run okay, then leave them renamed.  If 
> they don't run properly (should be obvious), rename them back.  I would 
> bet the fp versions will work just fine and most certainly faster (some 
> test renderings would prove it).

The original problem you are referring to was that the PP&S card HAD an
FPU, but the OS was not aware of it, due to the odd design of the PP&S. The
"rename" method would force the Toaster software to load the FP version,
even though it thought there wasn't one.

This will not work with 4.x versions of Lightwave, only FP versions are
being supplied now. So if the OS doesn't think you have an FPU, you're out
of luck.

An important thing to remember is for full 040 support, the file
'68040.library' MUST be present in the SYS:LIBS/ directory. Otherwise, the
OS will not be able to access the FPU on a 68040 system.

The PPS board, due to it's unusual design, required a 68040.library
from PP&S, the file supplied with Workbench 2.1 and onwards did not work
with the PP&S board. This unlucky fella may not have his PP&S
"patch/kludge" files installed properly.

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